What Happens Between Doors

I came home to find them standing outside

their apartment,

not touching,

voices low and controlled

like anger

that had learned to be quiet.

The distance between them

was the loudest thing

in the hallway.

Not the words—

the words were small,

contained,

almost polite

in the way they were shaped.

It was the space.

The space where they weren't looking at each other.

The space where hands

didn't reach.

The space where two people

stood side by side

and managed to be completely alone.

I moved past them

like I hadn't seen anything,

like the silence between them

wasn't louder than any fight

I'd ever heard.

But I heard it.

I heard the specific way

anger lives

in the distance between two people

who used to be close.

I heard it in the hallway

that night,

and I heard it again

when I locked my own door.